Marama Fox

Peter Dunne and David Seymour thought they’d help out Nick Smith with RMA reform.

Unfortunately for them he spat in their faces and preferred a solution that caves in to brownmail.

The Government and the Maori Party have struck a deal to back Resource Management Act reforms, despite a last-ditch bid from other parties to provide a better offer.

The announcement ensures the controversial Resource Legislation Amendment Bill, intended to speed up planning and consent laws, will pass into law after years of delays.

In a statement on Thursday, Maori Party co-leaders Marama Fox and Te Ururoa Flavell announced they had reached agreement to support the final stages of the legislation.

“We’ve worked hard on the outcomes to reach an agreement that we are satisfied with,” Flavell said.

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Nick Smith is exactly like Malcolm Tucker’s coffee machine.

Nick Smith has screwed up again.

Last minute negotiations between the Maori Party and the Government are continuing as Environment Minister Nick Smith bids for the party’s support for his landmark Resource Legislation Amendment Bill.

Maori Party Co-Leader, Marama Fox, told POLITIK last night that unless the party gets Smith’s agreement to change a clause in the Bill relating to GE-free regions, the party will withdraw its support for the Bill altogether.

That would be a major embarrassment for the Government over what is one of its legislation show pieces.

Fox appears to be suggesting that Smith renegged on an undertaking he had given the party.   Read more »

Bill English is on record as saying he preferred a deal with the Maori party ahead of Winston Peters.

Now with a kiss and make-up deal between the Maori and Mana parties that hope is somewhat distant now.

The Maori Party and the Mana Party are about to sign an agreement that’s expected to involve electorate deals designed to enhance their chances of winning seats.

Neither party will talk about the agreement ahead of the signing today in Whangarei.

Peace moves between the two parties have been going on since July last year when Maori Party president Tukoroirangi Morgan approached Mana’s leader Hone Harawira.

At the time, Maori Party co-leaders Te Ururoa Flavell and Marama Fox ruled out an alliance but said they were “open to a more cohesive relationship”.   Read more »

Between the grandstanding of Peter Dunne and the brown-mailing of the Maori party I think the government really needs to look a bit closer at other solutions for governing.

The Maori party has declared they will fight the government tooth and nail over legislation this year. With friends like them who needs enemies.

Maori Party co-leader Marama Fox is threatening to walk away from the Government over new legislation that doesn’t ensure Maori children are placed with whanau when the state removes them from their home.

Prime Minister Bill English isn’t budging on the wording in legislation to overhaul Child, Youth and Family (CYF), which would remove the priority to place a child with a member of their family or wider hapu if possible or someone with the same cultural background.

“Just because we want to provide a safe and loving home doesn’t make it mutually exclusive to a Maori home,” Fox said.

“We’re not talking about putting a child back into an unsafe home – that’s stupid – but just because it’s a Maori home doesn’t make it an unsafe home and that’s where we want to make it explicit in the law.”

Fox said she’d “fight for this every day of the week”.

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As I did with all the other political parties I approached the Maori Party for comment on the New Zealand sponsored UN resolution 2334 against Israel. After I received a response from their media spokesperson I e-mailed her the following questions:

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Newshub via NBR

Outspoken former National Party leader Don Brash has gone head to head with Māori MP Lousia Wall over his latest attack on perceived preferential treatment for Māori.

He told The Nation Māori chiefs signed away their right for sovereignty more than a century ago and it’s about time the Government realised it.

“There can be no basis for special privileges for any race, no basis for government funding based on race,” Dr Brash said back in 2004, when he was National Party leader. Read more »

Marama Fox lost her debate against Imperial Tobacco by labelling Dr Axel Gietz as “Goebbels” when discussing plain packaging on The Nation.

When you resort to Nazi allegations you have lost the argument.

Maori Party co-leader Marama Fox has stormed out of a TV interview after accusing a tobacco company spokesman of “peddling death and destruction and misery”.

Ms Fox got into a heated discussion with Imperial Tobacco spokesman Dr Axel Gietz on TV3’s The Nation today.

Dr Gietz said if the introduction of plain packaging goes ahead as planned, it could create a tobacco black market in New Zealand.

Ms Fox became angered during the discussion and accused the tobacco spokesman of “peddling death and destruction and misery on our people”.

She also compared Dr Gietz to Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels.

Dr Gietz is in New Zealand to oppose plans to introduce plain packaging.

Read more »

MP Marama Fox walks off the set of The Nation after comparing tobacco lobbyist Axel Gietz to a Nazi Germany leader.
screenshot-whaleoil.co.nz

MP Marama Fox walked off the set of The Nation this morning after calling a spokesman for big tobacco a “peddler of death”.

She told Imperial Tobacco spokesman Dr Axel Gietz: “You make billions of dollars every year profiting off misery and death. You are a peddler of death.”

Before getting up and walking out, she said: “I’m not going to listen to you. I think you should crawl back into the hole that is reserved for corporate executioners.”

She also compared him to a leader from Nazi Germany.

Gietz is in the country as a result of New Zealand’s moves to bring in plain packaging for tobacco products like cigarettes, something the industry is opposed to.

…During the debate, Fox likened Gietz to “Dr Goebbels” – referring to Joseph Goebbels, the head of propaganda during Adolf Hitler’s rule in Nazi Germany.

Gietz – who is German – said the attack was a first for him.

“I get called a lot of names,” he said. “What happened to me this morning, that was a first.”

“Yes, I get called names, but you know what, my experience is it doesn’t help to do a tit for tat. I try to do the voice of reason. I try to put forward my arguments.”

Fox admitted she had gone on The Nation to give Gietz “a bit of a telling off”.

But, she said, likening him to a Nazi leader “might have been a step too far”.

She said Goebbels was known as Dr Death, and she saw both as peddlers of death.

Gietz didn’t appear to take offence at the insult.

“Nobody gets anywhere by ranting at people and losing their tempers.”

He joked Fox’s outburst could go viral.

-Stuff

Moko Rangitoheriri

Guest post by Gavin

Since he entered Parliament where we have heard him go on about fight clubs in Serco run prisons where thugs were beating up thugs. Trips to Australia to support the 501 deportees and Andrew Little going to the Australian Parliament to lobby for them. Yet he has remained silent on the latest death of little Moko.

Why is this? Why is he silent on a real issue? Why is the only real leader turning out to be Alan Duff.

I saw Tariana Turia debate Marama Fox on why Chris Brown should be allowed to come here. Incidentally she looked rather silly defending the indefensible. Why are the rest of the Maori leadership and MP’s silent on this issue? What are they afraid of to speak out and face the truth. As others have stated there was an absence of Maori leaders and flags in the various marches for Moko. Read more »

Mihingarangi Forbes, Red Radio’s Māori Affairs Correspondent, weighs in:

New Zealand’s House of Representatives has many labels and, in Māori, it is often translated as the Lion’s Den.

In 2015 there were 25 Māori MPs in the den. Many started as fresh cubs following the 2014 general election, and they joined a number of experienced pride members.

The spread of Māori MPs across the political spectrum is diverse, with six sitting in the centre, 10 falling to the left and the rest sitting in the government pews.

Who outperformed who? According to Māori commentator Emma Espiner, one of Labour’s Māori MPs topped the list.

“I think you’d have to say without a doubt that Kelvin Davis has dominated this year, and the interesting thing for me is that he’s done this with a general portfolio,” she said.

“So he hasn’t been relegated to Māori Development or Māori Issues, although there is a significant Māori component in what he’s been dealing with.

“It will be interesting how he fares against [incoming Corrections Minister] Judith Collins; he had a bit of an easy run against Sam Lotu Liga.”

It’s been all steam and no hangi really.  Serco had sown the seeds of their own demise and all that Davis did was pick up the Corrections Association batton and ran with it.  When it came to the Australian New Zealanders who didn’t want to come to New Zealand, Davis claims he didn’t even plan to be involved and was kind of accidentally drawn in.   Add in a dash of Media Party meddling and we had almost two months of drama over next to nothing.   Read more »